


Small Print 4: Hell's hunter

by TheFierceBeast, VioletSmith



Series: Small Print [4]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Awesome Bobby Singer, Blue Balls, Canon-Typical Violence, Case Fic, Crobby - Freeform, Demon Deals, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Slow Burn, Small Print, UST, hot bear on bear action, minor hunting injury
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-07
Updated: 2018-01-07
Packaged: 2019-03-01 16:05:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,029
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13298379
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheFierceBeast/pseuds/TheFierceBeast, https://archiveofourown.org/users/VioletSmith/pseuds/VioletSmith
Summary: Bobby goes out langsuir hunting. It doesn't go quite how he expects it to.





	Small Print 4: Hell's hunter

The case he's investigating might be just the distraction Bobby needs from thoughts of Hell. Of Hell-gotten habits. So when he finds himself driving deep into woods past sundown, it's a relief. He's working on a hunch, only guessing at this thing's location and the means to kill it from the lore he's gleaned from Crowley's book. Heck, he's not even a hundred percent this thing _is_ a langsuir, which makes this particular solo mission either a wild goose chase or critically reckless. Either way, the risk of it being the latter has him distracted enough from his current more personal problems that he's grateful for it.

Langsuir, so the text states, need somewhere to roost in the daytime that's secure enough to store prey. They shy away from human habitation, which might be dandy in Malaysia, but is sure trickier in the suburban US. The only place near enough the boy's family home that seems likely to Bobby is a small complex of caves that sit deep enough in the woods that they're not well-known. When the track runs out he parks the Ford and kills the engine, listening to his own breathing in the sudden darkness while he psychs himself up for the hunt.

The undergrowth is sparse, at first, and dry enough at this time of year that every footstep crackles. There's a big fat moon out overhead, and for a time that's enough light to see by. Just. In places where the trees are denser and the ground more treacherous, Bobby takes out his flashlight. It illuminates little claustrophobic patches of black-and-white foliage. Bobby's used to living on his own, but just for a moment he feels every ounce of how alone he is out here. How far from a friendly face or familiar voice. He shakes the notion off: he's getting soft. Too used to days spent with his nose in a book, or off hunting with Rufus or the boys. Too used to Crowley dropping casually by like he's the guy next door come to borrow a cup of sugar, and don't that just sound like the plot to a bad… Bobby pauses, sighs. Switches off his flashlight and stands in the dark, letting it soak in, acclimatising to every little night-time sound. He's used to the woods: monsters ain't the only type of hunting he's well-versed in. When you know the lay of a place, it's easy to pick out any little _something_ that's off. Somewhere beyond, deep into the trees, a noise sounds, so faint he maybe imagined it. Instantly the hairs go up on Bobby's nape, his breath catches. That sound again: like a muffled human cry. He raises his gun, releasing the safety as quiet as he can, creeping in the direction of the noises. He moves fluidly, with the sort of ease that comes with long practice, muscle memory kicking in until he's all instinct, breathing steady, pulse loud but measured in his own ears. The stresses of the last few weeks, the endless overthinking, it all falls away as the world shrinks down to just this. Just the trees and the monster beyond them, and Bobby's own footsteps in the undergrowth. He feels calm. Maybe a little reckless.  
  
His breath almost stills completely as the mouth of the first cave looms, darker against the dark wall of rock face that rears, pewter-sheened in the moonlight, through the trees. This is fine. This is familiar. Too familiar for anything as self-indulgent as fear. Bobby's hand instinctively checks the dagger in his belt. He raises his rifle silently, creeping forward into the darkness.  
The cries that led Bobby here have fallen silent. He hopes the kid is alright, but knows better than to let it distract him. There's a smell in the cave, strong and unpleasant but not overpowering. Smells like something old, something half rotten. Whatever is in there, it's quiet. Well, so is he. He squints into the gloom, inching forward, aware that the slightest disturbance of a loose rock could give him away. If the creature hasn't scented him already.  
The cave takes a turn left, narrowing, the ceiling lowering so that Bobby has to crouch a little. Water drips, a steady tick, tick that is anything but comforting. He thinks he sees a light. A distant glow, like there's a lamp burning a couple turns down the way. The tunnel kinks again: Bobby noses the barrel of his rifle round there first. Lets loose a round with a stifled yelp as something grabs him around the throat from _behind_ and doesn't let go. There's blood at his neck, a knife blade digging shallowly into the skin - no, not a knife. A claw. Bobby scrabbles, tries to get a good hold to throw the creature off him, but just as he thinks he's found some purchase the thing lets go - drops him like a hot coal and makes a sound somewhere between a hiss and a shriek.

He wheels round to look as he scrambles back, crouched clumsily beneath the low roof. In the dim light he makes out long black hair, a face that might be pretty, contorted in thwarted rage. " _Marked_."

"Say what, now?"

"You." The creature's voice is a heavily accented hiss. Far from attacking again, it's beginning to back away, sidling close to the cave wall. It gives Bobby a new kick of courage: he scrambles to his feet.

"And what about me, Fugly?"

The creature narrows its eyes. "You belong to Hell."

The words wind him, hard as any blow. Bobby falters, and the pause of shock is filled with a fluttering sound, like wings. "Oh no you don't." He collects himself just barely, looses a round of salt at the half-formed thing that screeches and falls writhing to the cave floor in an explosion of feathers.  
  
Not enough to kill it, or even really wound, but it buys some precious seconds. Bobby is on it on a flash, hesitating only long enough to work out where the thing's neck _is_ on the monstrous halfway stage between human and owl. It makes no sound as he drags the blade. Blood wells. Gushes. Bright red and too human-looking even in the feeble glow from the end of the cave. He isn't thinking of Crowley. He isn't. As it dies, the creature's eyes hold a horribly knowing expression.

From further into the cave, Bobby hears a piteously weak cry.  
  
***  
  
Bobby's neck is still bleeding sluggishly, there where the creature gashed it, when he finally gets home after taking care of the kid. Poor boy had been weak and panicky but otherwise unharmed, so Bobby had taken him straight back to his folks, happy to leave it with them.  
  
He swipes at his neck where the blood is tacky, itchy on his skin as it dries. Pushes open his front door.  
  
It only really hits him now he's safe, in private: he's dog-tired. Shoulders sagging, he kicks off his sneakers. The bloodied dagger clatters on the hall table, next to his truck keys and Bobby exhales his millionth stunned laugh at what the hell is this life. He'll clean the dagger later. Right now, he needs a drink and a lie down. His hands are shaking, adrenalin wearing off, and bloody too: blood goddamn everywhere. Without warning, his knees feel weak and Bobby sits, heavily, on the stairs. Looks at his hands: the lines in his palms are delineated in rusty red, a mingling of him and the langsuir. It brings up those familiar flashes in his memory, of different, more intricate lines of blood, telling a story upon his flesh. _Marked_. The creature's words ring in Bobby's ears and he feels suddenly faint. It _knew_. And the knowledge seemed to make it... afraid.  
  
His mind is so preoccupied with these thoughts, and so fuzzy from the blood loss and adrenaline dip, that Bobby barely even startles at the unexpected, familiar voice -  
  
"I leave you alone for five minutes," it says, tutting, and Bobby looks up slowly at the demon standing in his hallway.  
  
"Crowley," he grunts, and wonders when he got comfortable enough with the King of Hell that his sudden appearances no longer trigger Bobby's fight or flight response.  
  
"You pick your moments, don't ya?" Sitting as he is, Crowley looms over him for once. It tugs at an uncomfortable thread in Bobby's memory but damn it, he is just too beat to stand and face the demon down this time. "Thanks for the tip, by the way."  
  
"I'm sure I don't know what you're talking about." Crowley's eyes seem fixed to his neck. Bobby swipes at it again, feeling strangely self-conscious. "You're hurt." Crowley says this like the idea is deeply distasteful to him.  
  
"I know." Bobby's skin crawls, warm, under the scrutiny. He injects every drop of sarcasm he's able into the words. "Who the Hell ever heard of a _Hunter_ gettin' bashed up on the job? Gonna be havin' stiff words with management over this." He prods gingerly at his neck. Wants to get washed up, kick back, but can hardly take his eye off Dick Dastardly there, who apparently can't take his eyes off Bobby... And suddenly that's not all he can't keep off Bobby, taking Bobby's hand and lifting it, _inspecting_ it, glare turning murderous at the blood on it. Bobby snatches his hand back. "Do you mind?" That touch hadn't been anything he'd expected. Not just the fact that Crowley'd invaded his personal space to start with, but that he'd felt so... human. "It ain't all mine, if that's what's got your interest: I ain't headed downstairs _quite_ yet."  
  
Bobby thinks he sees red in Crowley's eyes, just for a moment. He's probably just imagining it. And it definitely shouldn't have this effect on Bobby, making his chest feel tight and his pants even tighter. Hell, he's surprised he's got the energy to respond to anything like that just now. Undeterred, Crowley takes Bobby's chin in his hands and raises it, getting a good look at the wound. It's superficial, Bobby's sure. "Yes," Crowley's saying. "You've got that thing's blood all over you. I could smell it on you all the way to Hell."  
  
"Right. Cos I _belong_ to Hell." Those words still echo too loudly in Bobby's head.  
  
"Exactly." Crowley's still looking all pinched, like Bobby smells bad. It's kinda funny. "I want it off you."  
  
He sounds so oddly _possessive_ that Bobby's eyebrows raise, surprised and a little unnerved and... he's not sure what all else he's feeling. "What's up, Princess? The dirty monster blood stinkin' up your property? I'll tell you what. How's about you _give me some goddamn space and let me wash it off for you_!"  
  
Crowley's attention seems to sharpen, somehow, at those last two words that Bobby hadn't even thought about letting slip out. _For you_. "You're exhausted," Crowley comments, as if he's only just now noticing it. "Let me."  
  
Bobby scrubs a weary hand across his face. Winces, because actually, that thing's blood really _is_ beginning to reek. "Crowley, you ain't my nursemaid." There's none of the disdain he wants to hear in the words. He just sounds flat. "If you wanna help..." The words stick in his throat as he goes to haul himself to his feet, and Crowley catches him solidly by the hand, steadying him as he wobbles, other hand braced against the wall. "...you can clean that blade for me." Crowley huffs a little noise of annoyance. He ignores the blade entirely and supports Bobby with inhuman strength upstairs to the bathroom. "What are you doing?" Bobby asks, tiredly, as he's manoeuvred through the door.  
  
"Maintaining my investment."  
  
"I had to ask."

The asshole doesn't even hover awkwardly in the doorway or something, Bobby thinks, just settles right on in. Leans against the wall and crosses his arms comfortably and doesn't even attempt to disguise how he's watching.

Bobby rolls his eyes. Aims his balled-up flannel at the laundry hamper and cranes his neck to inspect the scratches, in the mirror above the basin. When he catches sight of Crowley in the mirror the demon's running his eyes over Bobby's back like he can see something there that Bobby can't. It makes Bobby shiver. It makes him think of knives, and words written in a language he can't understand. "Take a picture, it'll last longer." As soon as the words are out, and he sees Crowley's smirk, it strikes him that he wouldn't put it past the bastard to do literally that. He exhales a short-tempered huff. And then he tugs off his T and aims it after the flannel. Even as he does it, he ain't quite sure why. Sure, it's bloodstained, soaked in sweat, but he can clean his neck up just fine with his t-shirt on... Then again, not like he's got anything to be ashamed of. It's his damn house. He's in good shape. _Crowley's seen it all before_ his brain helpfully supplies.  
  
He nearly jumps out his skin when he feels a warm hand on his back. "Here," Crowley says, and catches Bobby's eye in the mirror. "Let me take care of it." He raises a soft wash cloth that Bobby's fairly sure he hasn't seen before in his life to the back of Bobby's neck. It glides across the skin, the short hairs at the nape of his neck. Dips over his shoulder, touching the coarse hair on his chest. Bobby shivers, nipples stiffening with what he tells himself is the cool night air.  
  
Although quite why the cold's apparently having the same effect downstairs, he doesn't wanna examine too closely. "Well, who'd've known? King of the Crossroads, a regular Florence Nightingale." It comes out spiteful and Bobby's viciously glad and guilty at once: he's cross that Crowley is being so nice and helpful. How irrational that is only makes him angrier. Behind him, Crowley hmmms obliviously. The cloth passes gently over one of the deeper gashes and Bobby flinches. The worst part of this, he realises suddenly, is that it's actually kinda nice to be fussed over for once. There's a pleasant tingling on his skin wherever the cloth touches, a gentle numbness that takes the edge off the pain. It feels like magic. "You drugging me again?" Bobby murmurs, head suddenly heavy, threatening to drop back onto Crowley's shoulder.  
  
"Again?" Crowley's voice has some quality Bobby can't put a name to. Amusement, maybe. Indulgence. "Have I drugged you before?"  
  
"Hmm." Bobby is quite sure this is the case. "Can't remember it though." It's... not _quite_ a lie. Impressions flicker across Bobby's memory. Those half-remembered dreams. _Marked_. "Crowley-?"  
In the mirror, Crowley's head tilts, expectantly. And Bobby wants to ask _that thing - why did it run from me? What have you done to me?_ but he's so unexpectedly struck by wondering what Crowley looks like under that fancy suit that his words run out.  
  
"Don't worry," Crowley says, and he seems so genuinely warm and soothing that it's hard for Bobby to keep telling himself that this is a demon, evil, can't be trusted. "You just need a good night's sleep." The wound on his neck is a dull ache now. Bobby wants the pain back. He wants... in a moment of insanity, he wants Crowley to be the one that put it there. Or to go over it and open it up again, to make it his. Crowley leans in close and inhales, like Bobby's shameful thoughts are drifting in the air visibly between them and he can't get enough.  
  
"I still smell like langsuir?" Bobby's voice is quiet. It's all he can do to not lean into Crowley's touch.  
  
"I went to kill it," Crowley says, instead of answering Bobby's question. "Did you know that?" Bobby's head is swimming with exhaustion and with proximity to the man - _demon_ \- who has been starring in so many of Bobby's blood-soaked sex dreams lately. But he thinks this might be important. Something he should focus on.  
  
"What the devil you talkin' about?" Bobby tries to look round at him, but Crowley's still stood at his back, visible only in the mirror. "If you were on that thing's tail how come it wasn't cinders already?"  
  
Crowley's mouth crinkles at the edges. Bobby's a little horrified to realise that he knows him well enough to know that he's holding back a smile. "It wasn't on my radar until I realised it had hurt you." His eyes rake over Bobby and, again, it's like he's seeing something on Bobby's bare skin that's not there. Or that Bobby can't see. "I couldn't really allow that. It's disrespectful. There's an unspoken understanding between Hell and most dark creatures - they don't get in my way and I don’t turn them into something you could drink through a straw."  
  
"It was scared of _you_." The realisation sends several feelings coursing through him. Disgust. Anger. A weird kind of arousal. "A hunter protected by Hell? What kinda fresh messed-up is that s'posed to be?" _There are worse side effects that deal coulda had_ says the voice in Bobby's brain. But he just can't shake this _outrage_.  
  
"Hmm. Terrible, isn't it? I don't know what the world's coming to. Still," Crowley brushes imaginary lint from Bobby's bare shoulder. Bobby flinches from the touch like it stings. "You do represent a significant investment. It would be a pity to see all that hard work wasted."  
  
_Kiss him_ says the voice in Bobby's head, an impulse so sudden that it makes him startle again. _Never been this damn twitchy in his life before_. Crowley's hand lingers, near his bicep: quick as a shot Bobby grabs him around the wrist, twists around to face him down. Crowley blinks up at him disingenuously, face full of suppressed mirth. "Thanks for patchin' up your investment. Now, I think it's about time you left."  
  
Crowley raises an eyebrow and for just a moment there's a pause between them that feels taut, like something stretched almost to breaking. Then- "If you insist," Crowley says, and Bobby stumbles when he finds himself holding onto nothing.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much to everyone who's following this! Extra love to the folks who comment <3 We promise the UST will break... eventually ;)


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